Chapter 3

Chapter 3

I fell silent.

It was not impossible. I simply did not know whether it was allowed.

I summoned the System. “Can he come?”

The System seemed to have given up on maintaining any rules. As long as I agreed to return, it would accept almost any condition.

“Fine. Two people, then. He’s only a child. How much trouble could he cause?”

It tipped an object resembling a phone out of its storage space and tossed it to me.

“Cheng Nian’s birthday is in one month. Please look after him and help settle him during that time. When the month is over, press this, and you can return.”

It paused. “Agreed?”

Xu An’an’s request had been settled. I turned at last to Xu Chengzhou.

He had spent the entire conversation leaning against the wall, head bowed, staring at his shoes. As if he sensed my gaze, he raised his head and met my eyes.

“Shen Zhi, I only have one condition.

“If you’re determined to go, let me make a deal with the System.

“If anything happens and you can’t come back after a month, give me one chance to go there—to contact you and find you.”

And so I returned to the world of that novel.

The System deposited Xu An’an and me where I had lived before leaving: a modern apartment complex in the city center.

Since I would be staying for only a month, finding another job would have been pointless. The System simply rented my old apartment again.

“Unit 728. It looked as if it had been empty for years, so I signed the lease without asking. You don’t mind moving back in, do you?”

Why would I? I shook my head.

“It’s fine.”

Strangely, even after seven years, the apartment remained spotless, as if someone cleaned it regularly. There was not a speck of dust on the table.

I remembered Cheng Nian just after he was born, a tiny bundle curled in my arms.

He had been my first child, my only connection to that foreign world. Something inside me seemed to melt at the memory.

For a while, Cheng Su had been too busy with work to take him to the family estate, so Nian had spent nearly all his time with me.

He learned to say, “Mommy.”

“Mommy, I love you.”

How had things ended the way they did?

Perhaps as he grew, he learned to weigh one thing against another. Between his family’s interests and the mother who had raised him, he learned which one he was supposed to choose.

It was Xu An’an’s first time in this world, and everything fascinated him. He pressed himself to the window and pointed this way and that.

“Mommy, what’s that tall tower? What about that one? What’s over there, past that building?”

His questions soon drove me to distraction, so I took his hand and led him downstairs.

“Mommy will show you around.”

He skipped along behind me.

We had barely stepped outside when I ran into an old friend and her daughter.

During my first stay in this world, I had lived here for years. I had become a professional interior designer and built a career and circle of friends of my own. I had earned a solid reputation, and my performance was considered excellent in the industry.

The moment my friend saw me, she seized my hand in astonishment.

“Shen Zhi! Where have you been all these years?”

She and I had worked at the same firm.

“Since you disappeared, business has gone downhill. We haven’t landed a proper collaboration in years. We finally have a major project again, so no, I am not letting you escape. You have to come take a look with me.”

I did not know whether to laugh or groan.

I would be here for only a month. How could I possibly get tangled up in work again?

I smiled helplessly and spent a long while trying to refuse her.

Xu An’an stood beside us. When our conversation dragged on, he grew restless and wandered over to play with my colleague’s daughter. She was fourteen or fifteen and just as outgoing as he was, so the two hit it off at once.

Before long, they had run out of sight.

My friend laughed. “Let my daughter show your son around. They’re still inside the complex. She’s lived here for more than ten years and knows everyone. He’ll be fine.”

The gated complex was small. This woman had also been one of my closest friends in this world, someone I trusted.

I assumed nothing could happen.

Barely ten minutes later, her phone rang.

It was her daughter.

“Mom, Aunt Shen, come quickly! An’an is fighting with someone!”

Calling it a fight was generous. Xu An’an was being bullied.

My friend and I had just finished talking, and I had agreed to visit the office in a few days. The moment the call came, we ran.

The children were not far away, beside a flower bed near a narrow patch of sand.

A boy who looked around ten had Xu An’an pinned to the ground. He shook a fist in his face and spat a stream of ugly insults. My friend’s daughter pulled desperately at the boy’s arm, trying to drag him away.

Whether she was not strong enough or the boy was using all his strength, he did not budge.

Then we arrived.

My head rang at the sight.

Xu An’an was not a troublemaker. He was gentle, cheerful, and surrounded by friends—the sort of child everyone called good.

Regret flooded me. Why had I let him out of my sight on our very first day back?

I charged forward and pulled him out from under the other boy.

“Are you hurt? Where does it hurt? How did this start?”

I was so worried that I saw only An’an. I did not spare the other child a glance. I may even have shoved him.

At the edge of my vision, the boy fell onto the ground.

He rubbed his knee but did not move. Head lowered, he looked lost, as though he had no idea what he was supposed to do next.